Knowing Is Half The Battle
From the entirely accurate journal of observations kept by Ted Barnes. Throughout the day Ted experiences an increasing number of coincidences and strange occurences all based around Dr Who, advertisements for a convention appear in his morning paper and random pop-ups plague his browser when he gets to work. Later on his boss passes on a ticket to him for the grand opening of the new Diefenbacker casino in East London. It is apparently a Canadian owned company that has six existing Casinos, this will be the seventh and the first one outside of Canada. On a whim he goes to buy a Doctor Who video on the way home from work and entirely by coincidence finds one that he's wanted to watch for a while but has never been able to obtain.Whilst watching it, William Hartnell begins to talk directly to Ted and explains that he is his avatar and that Ted is a mage. The basics of magic are explained and Bill promises to keep Ted safe from the nastier elements of the world so long as he listens to him.Upon awakening Ted finds himself underneath his coffee table, and that the rest of his flat has been reduced to rubble. He uses entropy to make a path through the rubble and escapes out into the streets, avoiding a black car with tinted windows that gives him a bad feeling.At the advice of Bill, he goes along to the grand opening of the Diefenbacker casino in East London, where he is able to sense that strange magicks have been built into the place and are influencing the patrons. Looking to explore the building further he name drops his company and gets a tour under the pretense of bringing high rolling business partners to the casino for meetings.A man named George Harrison (not the Beatle) shows him a place within the casino called the Timber Wolf lodge, supposedly a businessman's club that works in tandem with the casino. Magical influence can still be felt here but the mood it creates is one of deals having been dealt rather than money having been spent. There is also a large stuffed wolf in the main hall of the lodge, which unnerves Ted and George informs him that it would not be possible to have it removed, regardless of the tastes of the guests he might bring.Having temporarily removed Mr Harrison (by making his cellphone explode), Ted attempts a proper examination of the lodge and discovers a strange artifact in a room hidden behind the fireplace of the main boardroom. He later becomes convinced that it was some form of node. Ted then tries to use magic to win some card games but doesn't enjoy much success and decides to leave before security asks him to. He pockets some casino chips on the way out.Upon leaving he is again pursued by the black car, the occupants of which are revealed to be men in black (Bill later tells Ted that they were unconnected to the casino). Ted evades them with his usual style and panache (translation: causing a malfunction in the ticket gates in a crowded tube station) and finds a hotel to spend the night in.Talking to Bill in his dreamscape, Ted is horrified when Bill informs him that the spells in the casino were harvesting quintessence from the people visiting it. Bill then warns Ted that he will have to wake up in a moment and that the two men in black are drawing near. Category:Mage Category:Adventures